It was December end in the year 2006.This was my 2nd visit to this wonderful place called Sikkim.First time was with my school in my eleventh class.This time we were a group of 10 member combining three families.The other two were my Jiju's school friends.Our first destination was Gangtok.After boarding the Darjeeling mail we hired a Sumo from Shiliguri and reached Gangtok at around 3 in the afternoon.We spent the night there at Hotel Panda International.A decent hotel but not a good value for the money we have invested there though.In the next day morning we started our journey for the north sikkim in a Sumo.One our way we saw Seven Sisters fall and some other falls.We reached a small village named Lachung at around 6 in the evening.It was freezing out there and the temperature was -2,3 degrees.The beds were very cold also but we somehow managed to sleep well.In the morning I did a daring thing by having a shower in cold water.It was like electric shock but after that initial shock I felt very well actually.After the shower I felt lot warmer and the cold was'nt effecting me that much.After breakfast we started our journey for YUMTHANG VALLEY.It was situated at a ltitude level of around 16200 ft.As we began our journey we immideatly encountered snow on both side of the track.After a while we encountered heavy snow on the path and our car was strugling to hold the grip on the road.But our driver Puran somehow managed to pass it.Just before the valley we again encounter heavy snow so we couldn't go any further.We parked our car and started playing with the snow.our driver went with his car to inspect the road condition ahead.After a shortwhile he came back and informed us that now we can go ahead.So we all went mad at that time and quickly got into the ride. After a 20 mins drive we reached Yumthang Valley.But here we didn't find any snow.But the valley was very beautiful.As our hunger for snow became larger we decided to go farther ahead towards YHUMESAMDONG or popularly know as the ZERO POINT situated at an altitude of 19000+ ft.We have to pay some extra money to the driver.After a couple of hours drive we reached Zero point.There were plenty of snow there.We played for a while.But we have to leave quickly as the weather was getting a bit worrying out there.So we returned to our hotel at lachung and had lunch at started our return journey to Gangtok.We reached Gangtok in the evening.Next day was alloted for our local sight seeing in Gangtok.We visited Rumtek monastry and some other view points and we had ride of the rope way.Next day we went to Thangu lake situated at an altitude of 12600 ft. The lake was half frozen.We then visited Nathula pass which is a India China border situated at an altitude of 16000+ ft.We also found some snow there.On our way back from nathula we encounterd heavy snowfall.Our driver couldn't see anything.There was an one moment when we almost died but our our driver somehow managed to pulled it off.Finally thanks to the Indian army patrolling car who guided us down the hill we saved our lives that day.Our next destination was PELLING.We reached Pelling next day.It was a 31st December.So we had a blast at night as our hotel hosted a nice party there.Next day we went to see some local areas.We visited Khechiperi lake and some other sight seeing areas.Finally our journey came to an end. We reached NJP next day evening and boared train and reached kolkata next day morning......
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